With the increasing number of migrants in different countries around the world, the need for communication between the migrants and their friends and family back in their home country is rising. Statistically, almost 200 million people around the world are working and living in a country other than theirs. Such migrants may also include the internal or domestic migration of workers from poorer villages or provinces to richer cities or districts for work, for example, the domestic migration of workers in China, India or Cambodia. While communication may be achieved via webcams and voice communication through the Internet, many countries and many people still do not have the luxury of using the Internet for communication. Therefore, the best option of communicating internationally is by phone. Communicating internationally through mobile phone is becoming more affordable with numerous telephone plans and packages offered by service providers all over the world. Additionally, calling across the border using a mobile phone through International Direct Dialing (IDD) is more reliable and provides a better quality of communication in comparison to using calling cards, VoIP protocols and Internet voice communication.
However, in countries with lower socioeconomic level, the cost of international calling can be quite overwhelming. Therefore, friends and family are unable to keep in touch with the migrants due to the cost of international calling. This situation can be quite frustrating and can cause emotional distress to the family members or friends of the migrant who would like to communicate with the migrant. A current solution to the aforementioned situation is to have the migrant transfer airtime from his/her prepaid mobile phone to the prepaid mobile phone of his/her friends or family back in his/her home country. This is known as international airtime transfer. International airtime transfer however, can only be achieved using prepaid mobile plans. The potential of airtime transfer increases with the fact that almost two thirds of the 3.4 billion mobile phone users worldwide subscribe to a prepaid mobile phone plan. Potentially 50 billion top-ups are performed in a year.
With the vast demand, numerous service providers expand their business models to provide airtime transfer not only for the migrants, but for any prepaid mobile phone users intending to transfer local or international airtime from one phone to another. While local airtime transfer may be more commonplace, international airtime transfer is still gaining popularity. In some countries, international airtime transfer may also be used in exchange for cash or other services and products. Consequently, by default through market practice, international air time transfer has become a means by which the lesser privileged transfer value or money rapidly to their loved ones. Nevertheless, international airtime transfer is disadvantageous in that it may require the users to register with the airtime transfer entities and provide information such as credit history, personal details and identification. This may be cumbersome, particularly for migrants who lack ongoing relationships with local banks or who have a bad credit history. For migrants who have tight schedules, having to go through a thorough check for credit history, filling of forms and verification just to transfer international airtime to family or friends back home is time consuming and is unnecessary as they may only stay in a particular country for a short period of time.
One prior art which discloses an apparatus and method for facilitating money or value transfer is US patent publication 2007/0295803. A transaction platform is used to transfer money from a market region to another, specifying transferring airtime value from a mobile phone to another mobile phone. The airtime value can be used for purchasing goods and services or exchanged for cash.
US patent publication 2006/0108414 on the other hand discloses an electronic commerce kiosk used for purchasing telephone calling card minutes and conducting other forms of electronic commerce. While the prior art discloses a kiosk usable by customers to purchase minutes on prepaid calling cards for international calls, it does not explore the usage of reloading a local prepaid mobile phone. Moreover, the prior art provides the customer with a unique identifier and a telephone number for the customer to call and activate the purchase which could be troublesome. The prior art focuses on purchasing airtime for long-distance call using a prepaid calling card. International airtime is therefore not transferred and reloaded to another prepaid mobile phone which may be located outside the country.
Therefore there is a need for a system to purchase airtime and reload a prepaid mobile phone without having to go through a cumbersome registration process and can be done through the means of a payment receiving means.